President Barack Obama on Monday acknowledged the frustrating technical difficulties that have plagued the federal website where consumers are supposed to enroll for health insurance under his reform law, but defended the law as an overall success.

“There’s no sugarcoating it: The web site is too slow,” Obama said at the White House. “Nobody is madder than me about the website not working as well as it should. Which means it’s going to get fixed.”

But he said the problems were on their way to being fixed, highlighted other venues through which people can sign up for new health insurance, and said other provisions of the Affordable Care Act have already improved health care for Americans.

“You may not know it but you’re already benefiting from these provisions,” Obama said. “They’re not going anywhere and they’re not dependent on a website,” he said.

“The point is the essence of the law,” Obama added, “is working just fine.”

The president promised that “some of the best IT talent” in the country is working to fix the Healthcare.gov website.